of the Singhora-Saraipali area, south-eastern Chattisgarh Basin - fieldi

Singhora-Saraipali area
The Singhora-Saraipali area (21º00' N to 21º30' N and 82º50' E to 83º20' E) is situated
in the southeastern part of the Chattisgarh Basin. The c. 1000 m thick sedimentary
succession of this area comprises conglomerate, sandstone, shale, and carbonates with
tuffs, unconformably overlying the Archaean crystalline basement. The sedimentary
strata dip gently at between 4º and 8º towards west. Das et al (1992; 2003) considered
this part of the basin as ‘Singhora Protobasin’ and classified the succession into
Singhora and Chandarpur Groups, separated by an unconformity (fig.1). The
Singhora Group is sub-divided into Rehatikhol, Saraipali, Bhalukona and Chhuipali
Formations. They suggested that the upper surface of the Chhuipali Formation is an
unconformity, and classified the overlying succession into three formations,
correlating them with the Lohardih, Chaporadih and Kansapathar Formations of the
Chandarpur Group. The unconformity line between the Singhora and Chandarpur
Groups passes through the Sishupal and Gomarda hills and is represented by thin
interval of arkose, feldspathic arenite and wacke arenite (Das et al., 2003).
The succession around Sarangarh-Damdama, north of the present study area
(some part is overlapping) is classified as Chandarpur Group by Patranabis-Deb
(2004), Patranabis-Deb and Chaudhuri (2008). The Chandarpur Group is subdivided
into three formations, Lohardih, Gomarda and Kansapathar Formations, co-relatable
with the three formations of Murti (1987). However, the Gomarda Formation is much
thicker and heterogeneous than the Chaporadih Formation, but is a lithostratigraphic
equivalent of the latter. Patranabis-Deb and Chaudhuri (2008) considered the
Chandarpur Group as the basal unit of the Chattisgarh Supergroup, lying
unconformably over the Archaean basement, whereas Das et al (1992 and 2003)
considered the Singhora Group as the basal unit. The main purpose of this work is to
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